


Dinosaur Color

by booksong



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Future Fic, M/M, Sendai Frogs, Uniforms, general spoilers for manga timeskip, mentioned uniform kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:34:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24831682
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/booksong/pseuds/booksong
Summary: "The color of it is so bright, bright enough to make him blink a couple times looking at it under the stark florescence of the indoor lights.  The uniforms had always been eye-catching on television and the web videos he’d watched—they were not a stately green that conjured images of forests or fresh growth, but an artificial neon reminiscent of astroturf, radioactive slime, or, appropriately enough, tree frogs.  Maybe a red-eyed tree frog, to be precise, considering the orange accents.He still remembers how he’d once called this hue ‘unapologetically unnatural’ when they’d caught a Frogs game on TV in university, and Tadashi had laughed his bright laugh on the couch beside him and said, “At least you would always be able to keep track of your teammates on the court, Tsukki!”Kei has never forgotten how Tadashi had said ‘you,’ even then."(Or; Kei gets a new jersey.  Tadashi approves.)
Relationships: Tsukishima Kei/Yamaguchi Tadashi
Comments: 31
Kudos: 330





	Dinosaur Color

“You’ll make it.”

“There’s no guarantee of that.” Kei finishes tying the laces on his trainers tight and neat, then reaches for his bag. It’s been sitting ready by the door since yesterday, and he has seen Tadashi eyeing it with a knowing little smile on his face every time he’s passed by since. Kei isn’t sure what Tadashi thinks he knows, though; he only put the bag there in advance so it would be one less thing he has to worry about this morning. Obviously.

“You will, Tsukki!” Kei sighs, because while _he’s_ running out of energy for rebuttals after an intermittent three months of this exchange, Tadashi seems happy to recite his part as many times as he needs to.

“This feels like our university entrance exams all over again,” Kei observes, settling the strap of the bag over one shoulder. He’s not in a uniform or anything, just the same casual athletic wear he wears for his runs and other workouts. But something feels different about carrying the duffel, different than a backpack or a work bag. It’s like it changes something in his posture without his permission. Tadashi looks knowing about that, too.

“And? I was right then, wasn’t I? C’mon, you should go and get there early; make a good first impression on everyone!”

Kei snorts. “ _If_ I get recruited, it’s not going to be because of my winning personality.” 

Privately, Kei thinks his best chance at making a good impression would be if Tadashi was coming with him, since he likely owes most good first impressions people have ever had of him to Tadashi. But they had agreed long before today that Tadashi wouldn’t attend the tryout. 

It had been a short discussion, painless only because it was scaffolded on bedrock. Tadashi had worn a soft, fond little smile the whole time, which made Kei suspect they had only really needed to have the conversation out loud for his benefit.

_“I want you to be there.” “I know.” “I might play better if you’re there. But I also might be...distracted.” “I know.” “Tadashi...I need to know I can do it if you’re not there.” “Tsukki, I know.”_ And Kei had kissed him, and Tadashi had burrowed against him under their shared blanket and turned on a taped Planet Earth rerun, and that had been that.

So now he allows Tadashi to take his shoulders and steer him out the door without resistance. He really can’t justify expending any more energy than necessary, today of all days.

As he steps into the bright weekend morning and turns to say his goodbye, Kei is expecting a parting quip about how Tadashi thinks he shouldn’t worry because his personality is _delightful_ , thank you very much, or that he’s never going to get recruited by anyone if he goes in with that attitude.

Instead, Tadashi takes Kei’s face firmly between his palms and tips his head down just enough to press their foreheads together. This close, Kei can see all the little specks of gold in his eyes, can count the individual freckles on the bridge of his nose.

“Look at me,” Tadashi says firmly, as if Kei could currently do anything else. “You don’t need to block every ball they send at you. You don’t need to play a perfect game. And you don’t need a winning personality. You just need your pride.” 

Then he kisses Kei quick and fierce on the mouth and grins before closing the door, generously leaving him alone to collect himself after such an assault. 

“Unfair,” he murmurs, chest tight and hot even as the next breath he takes feels like the cleanest, coolest air he’s breathed all morning. Already the world is more in focus, as if he’d only now put his glasses on. His thoughts settle, when he hadn’t even realized they’d been racing. At some point, the corners of his mouth have turned up without his permission. 

It’s even more unfair how it works, it _always_ works. Maybe that’s part of the reason he’s doing this, the reason he hasn’t, in the end, been able to stay away.

Kei hikes up the strap of his sports bag, and starts down the stairs toward the street. 

**

It’s getting dark by the time he makes his way back home that evening, drained and sore in a way that’s familiar. It’s a little annoying that he finds the sensations aren’t unwelcome, but Kei supposes by now there’s not much point in pretending he didn’t sign up for this. Quite literally, this time. 

Tadashi flings the door open before he can even put his hand on the knob, as if he’d been watching through the front door peephole all day.

Kei only has time to say, “I’m back,” before Tadashi takes one look at his face and lunges out to seize him in a full-body hug.

“Congrats, Tsukki!” he shouts, and Kei presses himself instinctively forward so he can get them both back through the doorway, before the neighbors come out to investigate the noise and find Tadashi clinging to him like an exuberant and freckled starfish.

“I didn’t even tell you if I made it,” he says, once the door is shut behind him and he’s dropped his bag so his arms are free to settle around Tadashi’s shoulders. 

He’s secretly glad he doesn’t have to, actually—he’s come to terms, mostly, with the way his heart had kicked in a way that had nothing to do with adrenaline when the Frogs’ coach had clapped his shoulder and made the offer. But saying “I did it” to anyone, even Tadashi, out loud still feels tinged with a strange mixture of arrogance and relief to him, and neither are quite right.

“I can tell you did. You would have looked different if you hadn’t made it. Come on, I already got you some cake to celebrate!” 

Kei wonders whether Tadashi would have rebranded the cake as a consolation prize if it turned out he hadn’t made the team, or if he’d just been that certain all along. He loves either possibility a mortifying amount.

Tadashi seems content to stay comfortably half-wrapped around him as Kei moves out of the entryway and towards the kitchen, only releasing him out of necessity when he has to dig into the fridge for the cake. He doesn’t let that stop him from starting the questioning, though. “How was it? Do your teammates seem nice? Was anyone we know there? How was the coach? Did they remember you from nationals?”

Kei sinks into one of the kitchen chairs. It feels good to sit, finally; it loosens muscle tensions he hadn’t even realized he was still carrying. “It was pretty straightforward, and I impressed them well enough, I guess. They have some strong receivers; no particularly stand-out spikers, but the ones they have are clever.” His lip curls reflexively, remembering. “No one we know, but they’re all fine. Friendly.” He’s not sure yet if he considers this last part a positive or not, and his tone reflects that. It makes Tadashi laugh.

He doesn’t tell Tadashi that he _did_ overhear some of them murmuring when they thought he couldn’t hear, about nationals and Karasuno High’s murder of crows and, even after all this time, about how Kei shut out Ushijima Wakatoshi’s spikes. He knows Tadashi would be smug about these things on his behalf and it’s embarrassing.

“You know I’m going to come to all of your games now,” Tadashi informs him, even as he passes over the slice of strawberry shortcake and a fork. Then he brings over the cup of tea he’s made for himself to sit opposite Kei. “They have discounts if you buy tickets for a full season, I checked.”

It’s not as if Kei hadn’t known Tadashi would support him unconditionally if he became a league player, but it was always part of the hazy, indistinct landscape of The Future. Now he allows himself to think about it with a fresh coat of immediacy. Not an _if_ anymore, but a _when_. 

He thinks about scanning the stands to find him, the way Tadashi will beam when their eyes meet. The way he’ll know for certain at least one other person in the arena will be following his thought process, his strategy as it evolves in real time. He thinks about Tadashi yelling his name whenever he serves or blocks, imagines his new teammates grinning and nudging each other and asking him who _that_ is. 

He finds he doesn’t dislike the idea as much as he once might have. Perhaps he’ll even deign to selectively answer some follow-up questions about Tadashi. Kei couldn’t care less if his new teammates know _him_ from Karasuno’s third-year high school nationals run, but he will make sure they know who had led that team there.

“So? When do you get it?” Tadashi’s voice breaks into his musings. He sounds sly now. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Kei does.

“Your uniform! Your _official Sendai Frogs uniform_!”

Kei pretends to be engrossed in his cake, because if he looks at Tadashi’s no doubt glowing face right now he isn’t going to be able to keep his own straight. “Practice doesn’t even start for another month; I’ll probably get it then. Or maybe when the actual tournaments begin. I don’t know.”

“You don’t _know_?” Tadashi sounds scandalized. “You didn’t ask? It’s practically the reason you even wanted to try out—”

“That’s ridiculous, it is not.” Kei doesn’t realize he’s got two fingers adjusting his glasses until it’s already too late and the gesture has undoubtedly given him away. “Anyway, how would that have sounded, if the first thing I did after being accepted was ask them about the uniform?”

“You could have said ‘oh thank you it’s such an honor’ and _then_ asked,” Tadashi insists. “Priorities, Tsukki!”

The truth is that Kei hadn’t allowed himself to imagine any further priorities past ‘make the team,’ but that sounds a little pathetic to say now that he’s actually accomplished it. Luckily, Tadashi rallies as quickly as ever.

“Well, I guess I’ll just need to represent enough for both of us in the meantime then!” And just like that, Tadashi is hefting his sleek black laptop onto the table between them. Kei hadn’t even seen when Tadashi had gotten it; had it been at their dining table the whole time? Kei swallows the last sliver of strawberry from his cake with a little twinge of foreboding at the preparation this implies. 

“I didn’t want to get _too_ ahead of myself and jinx you, Tsukki, but now I can finalize my shopping cart!” 

“Shopping cart? Oi, what site are you on?” Kei isn’t entirely sure he wants to hear the answer; it makes his voice come out less careless than he’d hoped. 

“The Sendai Frogs merchandise page, of course,” Tadashi says, without looking up from the screen, where he is already clicking eagerly. “Should I get us matching hats, or do you want to pick out your own?” 

Kei thinks about telling him that he really doesn’t need _any_ fan merchandise if he’s going to be on the actual team, but he already knows where that conversation will end, and it’s going to be right back on the checkout page of the Sendai Frogs fan site. He should probably simply be grateful Tadashi has stopped at getting him a hat. For now.

Resigned, Kei mentally decorates the hypothetical future Tadashi in the stadium bleachers with blindingly green, frog-themed attire. 

“You choose for me,” he sighs, and quickly gets up to wash his cake plate at the sink, just in case it shows on his face how unbearably fond the image makes him feel.

**

It turns out Kei gets his uniform two weeks later. He gets an email about picking it up, the same way he gets emails about new exhibits at the Sendai museum or new dinosaur discoveries his news app pulls from the science headlines. It’s a little surreal. 

Unlike in high school, there is no ceremony whatsoever surrounding the occasion—all Kei has to do is stop by the office where the team’s equipment is headquartered, present his ID, and the lady working the counter simply hands him the uniform, folded and brand new and sealed in a neat square of plastic. 

He turns the package over in his hands in the middle of the arena’s front lobby, the clear plastic wrapping crinkling. _Sendai Frogs_ is printed there on the jersey, right on the front _._

So this is what it feels like, Kei thinks, when something truly begins to sink in.

He’s inordinately pleased about the jersey number. Seventeen is not symbolic at all, not similar to any number he’s worn before; he just likes the way it looks. The strokes of each digit are straight, clean, sharp. Indivisible.

The color of it is so _bright_ , bright enough to make him blink a couple times looking at it under the stark florescence of the indoor lights. The uniforms had always been eye-catching on television and the web videos he’d watched—they were not a stately green that conjured images of forests or fresh growth, but an artificial neon reminiscent of astroturf, radioactive slime, or, appropriately enough, tree frogs. Maybe a red-eyed tree frog, to be precise, considering the orange accents.

He still remembers how he’d once called this hue ‘unapologetically unnatural’ when they’d caught a Frogs game on TV in university, and Tadashi had laughed his bright laugh on the couch beside him and said, “At least you would always be able to keep track of your teammates on the court, Tsukki!” 

Kei has never forgotten how Tadashi had said ‘you,’ even then. 

Kei contemplates taking a photo of the jersey, folded neat and new in its plastic packaging. Maybe with the back—which is printed with ‘TSUKISHIMA’ in bold white letters—facing up. He could send the picture to Tadashi on LINE and would doubtless receive a flood of little stickers and incomprehensible punctuation marks in return, which would be entertaining. But he decides against it.

Kei can think of something even better. 

**

He goes straight home, showers quickly, slides the eye-watering green jersey over his head and steps into the shorts. Both fit well, the fabric light and cool against his skin. 

It’s been years since he’s worn a proper uniform jersey; at the scattered club and association games he’d participated in, they simply pulled on practice colors over their clothes. He had forgotten how easy it is to move in one, and how easy it makes it to _want_ to move. The urge to drop into a leg stretch or to find a ball to play lightly off the tips of his fingers is real and instinctive; muscle memory is a scary thing. He even finds himself touching the back of his head unconsciously, fingers looking to adjust a sports goggles strap that isn’t there. 

Right on time he hears the distant tap of Tadashi’s feet on the stairs, and he heads for the front room. He’s not walking towards the start of a game in this jersey, not yet, but his body doesn’t seem to know that. Not with the way his heartbeat picks up speed.

**

The dull _thud_ of Tadashi’s work bag hitting the floor as he walks in the door and sees Kei standing there is deeply satisfying. Kei doesn’t normally think much of grand ‘reveal’ gestures, but he’s glad he made an exception for this one.

“That’s—! You—?! Ohhhh Kei, oh my god, it’s so...it’s so _green_ ,” Tadashi breathes, voice strangled with delight. He leaves his bag forgotten on the floor and comes at Kei so purposefully that he tenses on instinct, in case Tadashi intends to give him the kind of hug where he needs to brace for impact. But Tadashi stops himself short, apparently with an effort of willpower, and instead starts circling Kei with the air of a fashion designer inspecting a model. He doesn’t touch, but the intensity of his gaze makes Kei so fidgety that he wishes he would.

He’s a little disappointed Tadashi is behind him when he first spots the TSUKISHIMA on the back of the jersey; he’d wanted to see the expression that went with Tadashi’s sharp little intake of breath. 

When he finally stops back in front of Kei, his eyes are shining like it’s his birthday and he’s just been given the best possible present. “It’s _so_ much better in person than on TV!”

“Glad you approve. It’d be awkward if I had to go back and tell them I’m resigning from the team already.” Kei tries to make it dry but he knows he’s smiling, he’s been smiling ever since Tadashi walked in the door and he can’t make it stop. 

Whatever, they’re alone here. No one ever has to know.

As if his pronouncement on the uniform had broken an invisible barrier, now Tadashi moves in to feel the jersey’s material, to exclaim over every detail of the design and lettering. 

“The orange is a nice touch,” he observes, running a finger along the band of bright orange at the collar and the hems of the sleeves. “It’s like the feet on a red-eyed tree frog! I wonder if that’s on purpose...you think they had any specific frog in mind when they picked the mascot, Tsukki?”

Kei makes a vague, noncommittal noise and rubs a bit of the cool, light material of the jersey firmly between his thumb and forefinger, so that he doesn’t immediately give in to the urge to kiss Tadashi senseless.

“I know the frog connection is obvious, but this green is also a very dinosaur color,” Tadashi continues seriously, taking the hem and pulling the front of the jersey taut to admire the number 17.

“There’s no such thing as a dinosaur color,” Kei says automatically. Tadashi has seen all the same dinosaur documentaries Kei has, often at the same time, and should really know better. “Dinosaurs were all kinds of colors, most of them probably much duller than this, for camouflage purposes.”

“Okay, fine, but it’s the color little kids’ books and cartoons use for dinosaurs! You know what I mean!”

Of course Kei knows what Tadashi means, but there are some things he simply cannot compromise on when he’s going to be starting a position at a museum.

“It’s a tree frog color, yes,” he says, evasively. “Dinosaur, no.”

“Don’t make me go get ‘The Littlest Tyrannosaurus’ out of the box in the closet to prove my point, Tsukki!” Tadashi threatens. 

Kei thinks about whether it’s worth the effort to offer to find the relevant passage in his _Encyclopedia Dinosauria_ (newly revised and updated edition), or if that will just lead to Tadashi insisting on reading aloud to Kei from his aforementioned favorite childhood picture book, a tactic he’s often fallen back on in the past.

In the end he simply gives Tadashi an eloquent scowl and hopes he’ll leave it at an impasse.

Tadashi does, mostly because he still has the jersey to distract him. He walks around Kei a few more times, slow and appreciative. He gushes over the fit and the material, traces his forefinger over the TSUKISHIMA on the back one letter at a time, which makes Kei shiver lightly. 

Eventually, Tadashi seems to wear himself out and settles for simply draping himself against Kei's front in a hug, pressing his face into the vicinity of Kei’s sternum. He takes a deep breath through his nose and then releases it in a sigh; it tickles through the thin, porous fabric.

“Hmmmmmmm...it even smells good,” comes the muffled voice, sounding pleased about it.

“No, that’s me. I showered before you got home,” Kei tells the top of Tadashi’s head. 

Tadashi shakes his head without withdrawing it from Kei’s chest. “Smells like new sports gear. Nice. You too though, Tsukki,” he adds, a benevolent afterthought.

They spend another few moments in comfortable silence like that; Kei combing his fingers idly through Tadashi’s conveniently accessible hair, and Tadashi breathing softly against him and giving distracting little hums every so often.

Finally Tadashi lifts his head a bit, which means he’s just about eye level with the ‘Sendai Frogs’ lettering on the front of the jersey. Kei has a perfect view of the way his face melts into a slow, full blown grin. It’s the same expression he used to wear back in third-year, whenever they finished a tough match and it finally, visibly dawned on him that they’d won.

He tilts his head up to meet Kei’s eyes. “You’re really going to play for the _Sendai Frogs_ ,” he murmurs, and Kei recalls his own reaction when he first saw the words on the front of the jersey. The sense of a future both finally achieved and just barely begun at the same time.

“I really am.”

“In your dinosaur-colored uniform.”

Kei narrows his eyes. “You—”

Tadashi kisses him before he can get out another word, and Kei very quickly decides he doesn’t mind that he’s using it to press his advantage. He also doesn’t particularly mind when Tadashi tilts his head to coax the kiss deeper, slower, warmer. Or when Tadashi’s hands come up to stroke the curve from his ribs to his waist, his palms warm and each fingertip distinct through the thin jersey fabric. 

When he feels Tadashi’s fingers sneak under the hem of the jersey and start tracing his stomach and then the lines of his hipbones, though, he does draw back a little to raise his eyebrows slightly in question.

“I really like seeing you in a uniform again,” Tadashi admits without a trace of embarrassment, grinning at him.

“You jump me for the strangest things.” Kei is deliberately ignoring the time just two weeks ago when he’d pulled Tadashi into the bedroom in the middle of dinner, after being absurdly distracted by how his forearms looked against the white rolled-up sleeves of his company dress shirt.

“You should definitely wear it around the house this week. So you can get used to it before practices start,” Tadashi continues cheerfully, as if he hasn’t literally just admitted to having an ulterior motive to suggesting this.

“Hm...maybe I will, if you wear yours too.” Kei’s ears burn involuntarily at his own boldness, but something about wearing the jersey still seems to be messing with his head. Muscle memory, of a sort.

“Sure, which one?” Tadashi’s reply is so immediate that Kei chokes a little on his next inhale. So much for getting one-up in boldness.

Both of Tadashi’s Karasuno jerseys (his original #12 and his captain’s #1, because he’s sentimental like that) are folded neatly at the bottom of one of their dresser drawers. They’re also both a little tight on Tadashi now, though Kei in no way considers that a negative.

“...doesn’t matter,” he mutters, because even though he does have a preference (and Tadashi _knows_ he has a preference), he feels Tadashi has already won quite enough for one day.

“Maybe I’ll alternate!” Tadashi kisses Kei’s cheek and then his mouth again, generously neither calling him out nor preening over this unspoken victory. Then, just as Kei is thinking he’s fully prepared to pick up where they left off, Tadashi freezes.

“ _AH! I forgot!_ ” Without explanation he pulls away and vanishes down the hall to their bedroom, leaving Kei standing in the middle of the front room. The light material of the jersey suddenly feels a little thin and chilly, without the warmth of Tadashi’s hands. 

Rustling, rummaging noises start to drift out from the bedroom moments later. But Tadashi’s exclamation had sounded more excited than upset to Kei’s trained ear, and this shifts what would otherwise be concern into a kind of foreboding anticipation.

Tadashi comes back alight with triumph, the same glowing look on his face as when he’d first walked in the door and seen Kei. 

He has an identical, baseball cap-style hat in each hand. Both are the same bright green, embroidered with the Sendai Frogs logo. Both have an orange stripe around the edge of the bill and little half-moon googly eyes on top.

They are deeply corny in the particular way only sports fan merchandise can be. Part of Kei regrets giving Tadashi free rein in this matter, but it’s a surprisingly small part. 

“They came yesterday, but I wanted them to be a surprise for whenever you finally got your uniform! Don’t worry, the rest of the stuff is due to ship next week. The towel, and my other hat, and all three official iron-on patches, and the hoodie, and the limited edition sunglasses, and—” 

It occurs to Kei that his teammates on the court aren’t going to be the only ones who will be easier to spot during games.

“It really is the exact same color as your uniform, look!” Tadashi holds one of the hats up next to Kei’s chest to demonstrate, the same way he’d compared paint swatches on their bedroom wall. Then he reaches up and places the hat on Kei’s head, tugging lightly at the orange-rimmed bill to settle it. He takes a step back, apparently to admire the effect of the entire ensemble. “Fits okay? The strap is adjustable!”

It feels fine, although Kei is in no real hurry to find a mirror. 

Evidently satisfied, Tadashi pulls the other Frogs hat over his own work-ruffled hair, making the little goggle eyes on top bob merrily. It clashes deeply in color and style with his crisp button-up work shirt, and Kei truly needs to kiss him again, very soon.

“There, now we match!”

They do, Kei thinks. They really do. 

**Author's Note:**

> *This was written solely for self-indulgent fun and because the world always needs more ‘Yamaguchi wearing as much Sendai Frogs gear as humanly possible’ energy in it, so please forgive or overlook any errors or missing details from the sports world etc. etc. 
> 
> If you want to talk about tskyms, frogs (Sendai or otherwise), or which of Yamaguchi’s old high school jerseys is in fact Kei’s favorite, I’m @booksong5 on Twitter!


End file.
